Avicii Quotes

“A friend of mine told me a bunch of stuff on Buddhism and about Avicii being the lowest level of Buddhist hell, and it just sort of got stuck in my head. Later on when I went to setup a MySpace, I tried a bunch of names and they were all taken so I just kind of ended up with Avicii and then I got really attached to it.”

“A lot of work and thinking goes into my DJing. I want the entire night to progress seamlessly and when I have to adapt the energy on the fly for the crowd on any given night, I can do so with harmonic mixes that I've practiced over and over again. I am far from the only DJ that does this and it's something I take pride in being able to do.”

“Dance music is like a virus, it has affected so many different genres.”

“For me there are two types of country: There's the shoot-yourself-in-the-head country, and then there's really good country music.”

“House music originated in America, and it has always been around, but I guess it just got a tighter hold on Europe and other parts of the world.”

“I actually only started listening to house music around the time I started making it. I got hooked both to making music and to house music.”

“I always just sit down at the piano and make the main hook – what I want the track to be about melodically – and then I'll build everything else around that. But growing up, I did not play any instruments.”

“I always used to travel without a passport case, and because of it I think I'm four passports in. I bought this small Tumi case to protect my new one, and it works really well, not just for protecting it but also for keeping credit cards and small stuff. I just throw it in my bag when I'm traveling, as opposed to stuffed in my pocket.”

“I don't really look at the charts at all. If anything, I try to out-do what I've done before. I try to make music that I like and I trust my own judgement with what will work with a wider audience. If you compare yourself to the charts, you lose perspective on what you're doing and why you're doing it.”

“I grew up listening to a lot of Ray Charles and '60s rock, thanks to my father, and then my brothers got me in to KISS and whatnot, so I guess that's where I got my first taste for music.”

“I guess I think like deep inside, I know that it's like, it's a different kind of performing, it's not really... You're not performing like a guitar player or a singer is performing, you know what I mean? So it's weird to be in the same type setup as one of those. 'Cause I'm not really doing much, you know, like technically it's not that hard.”

“I have a hard time writing music when I'm on tour.”

“I have always been mainstream. It's so weird, because I don't see it as something negative at all. So many people see it as something negative.”

“I have my guy Semi who is my on the road – he's my personal trainer. He helps me out with training and stuff like that, and he's shown me a lot of things I can do on the road. We were trying to figure out something that I can do everywhere, like in my hotel room, so I don't have to have a gym.”

“I love DJing, I do. I love everything that comes with it; it's fun and it's kind of glamorous.”

“I love finding out-of-the-box inspirations and blending them with what I've done in the past. And when I started to experiment with genres, it didn't sound forced. Maybe that's because it's all music that I listened to growing up, and it's all music that I love.”

“I think I am a pretty good judge of character in general and try to surround myself with the best people I can.”

“I travel with a bunch of battery packs because I don't always have time to charge my phone at the hotel room when I'm traveling. I always change them, so I never run out of battery.”

“I would never lay down a pre-programmed set and perform to a pre-mixed CD; I would never cheat my fans like that.”

“I'm a DJ. I get the party started.”

“I'm good at melody – I'll write the top-line melody and ideal words I want to go with it. But I'm not that good at writing lyrics. I bounce those back and forth with songwriters or someone who can sing.”

“I've always been a producer – that's how I see myself first. The DJing came second as a way for me to be able to perform.”

“I've always had a fascination with making your own music but never have been skilled enough to play the instrument, so to be able to make music without the ability was awesome.”

“If I wanted to make a quick buck, there's far easier ways of doing it. What I want is to provoke people. If you want a hit song, all you need to do is rewrite an old song. It might have been proven to work, but you won't be remembered the same way.”

“It's hard – some people get inspired by a feeling, but I'm mostly inspired by melodies.”

“Lyrics are important, but it's hard, because English isn't my first language – although it feels like it is these days! I grew up with amazing melodies, so getting that right on a song has always been the key thing for me, but there's no reason why a great melody doesn't deserve great lyrics.”

“My dad has always been a big Ray Charles fan, and I've grown up listening to all kinds of music.”

“Obviously there is stuff that I wouldn't play in a club that I play at festivals, and vice-versa, but my sets are still dominated largely by my own music. I think that's what makes me stand out a bit. My music is also festival- and club-friendly, so it generally works out well.”

“Originality is definitely missing from EDM. There are people looking for it and exploring but I feel it's so big now it is just getting milked. House music is losing all its melody as it becomes more about how dirty the drop is and how energetic it is. It loses touch with what music really is.”

“People in Sweden are very conscious of what people are saying about you.”